Archbishop Paul (1953 – 2022)

 

Yesterday, I learned that an elementary school friend of mine, Archbishop Paul Gassios, passed away on April 24, Easter Sunday, of this year.

I believe we first met in Mrs. Allen’s kindergarten class at Robert Burns Elementary School in Detorit.  As his last name is Gassios and mine is Gavoor, whenever we lined up alphabetically, which was quite often in those days, Paul was right in front of me. 

Naturally, we got to know each other.  We were in classes together.  I admired Paul’s quiet intelligence.  He was a nice fellow.  We were on the safety patrol and were partners at the Hubbell and Lyndon intersection for one.  In our last year at Burns, 7^th Grade, I opted for a special duty on Safety Patrol: to raise and lower the flag each day.  It was a two-man detail.  So, I asked Paul if he wanted to do it.  He agreed.  It was a fun job and it was a great pleasure doing it with him.

There was a home economics teacher at Burns, for the life of me I cannot recall her name, who ran the Future Teachers Club.  She was a wee bit ahead of her time and sensed the changing tides of the various liberation movements that took root in the 1960s.  In that same year, 1965 when we were in 7^th grade, she decided to invite a few boys to join the Future Teachers Club which until then had been all girls.  She recruited the two of us, the flag detail boys, and young fellows that were likely to become teachers.  The meetings took place in the home economics classroom which we had never been in before.  While I do not remember many details of the meeting, I remember it was a good experience.  I believe that experience had some influence Paul’s calling to the ministry and mine to higher education.

I think Paul and I were also part of the glee club that year, the only year I participated.  We worked long and hard to put on a concert of songs from The Sound of Music. 

The next year we went to Cadillac Junior High which was for 8^th and 9^th grade.  It was a transitionary time there from a few perspectives.  The white flight really accelerated with the 1967 Detroit Riots.  Paul and I, were no longer in the same classes for whatever reason and we drifted apart.  I went to Cass Tech for High School and Paul went to Cooley.  We moved to Livonia in the middle of my sophomore year, and I just completely lost touch with him.

Over the passing years I would think of him now and again and wonder what became of him.  I had no way of easily finding out until… I joined Facebook.  I reconnected with many classmates from Burns and Cadillac.  Many of them went to Cooley together and never really lost touch.  In 2016, i asked if anyone of my Burns friends had any information about Paul and was directed to his Facebook page.  

I was most impressed to see he was a Bishop of the Orthodox Church in America Diocese of the Midwest.  He was based in Chicago.  We met for dinner at Greek Isles downtown on August 17, 2017.  I had arranged the dinner with our parish Priest, Father Ghevont, and my brother in-law, Jack, who was the Chairman of the Eastern Prelacy of the Armenian Apostolic church in the US.  We had a wonderful evening.  Bishop Paul and reminisced about our days at Burns.  Father Ghevont, Jack, and Bishop Paul compared the way the Orthodox Church in America and the Armenian Apostolic Church were organized and governed.  It was a great evening and a great pleasure for me to see my old friend.

We communicated a bit after that, but never saw each other again.  We were both busy and I would say his schedule was much more hectic than mine.  I would check his Facebook page now and then, basically to see pictures of my old friend in his vestments.  I learned he was elevated to Archbishop in 2020 in the midst of the Covid pandemic. 

I saw a posting yesterday.  It was a Facebook story of another Bishop of the Othrodox Church in America in Chicago.  I naively assumed Bishop Paul had been transferred to another Diocese, so I searched his name on the site and was, sadly, led to his obituary.  I read it few times.  I learned we were both graduate students at Wayne State University at the same time.  He was working on a Masters in Social Work and I was in Engineering.  I was in Manhattan at Colgate and he was in Yonkers at St. Vladamir’s Seminary in the early 1990s.  We might have crossed paths in either of those times.  Coincidently, he was ordained on my birthday, June 25, 1994.  I read the heartfelt and touching sentiments his faithful flock left had posted and felt a surge of pride for my childhood friend.

I am sorry we were not able to spend more time together the past few years, but I am glad I did have the chance to reconnect in 2017 and see the path that he and God had chosen for him.  I will remember, Archbishop Paul Gassios of Blessed Memory, fondly.